Money and College

Going into college I had a scholarship that provided $3000 a semester but required a 3.0 GPA to keep it. My first semester I pulled a 2.98 GPA (mostly because of Dr. Szabo’s Critical Approaches to Literature class and the fact that I am an antifeminist—New Chauvanist—and rebel against the standard academic approach to literary interpretation, preferring to read what the author wrote rather than projecting some other interpretation on the work. . . and because I hadn’t thought I through far enough to articulate my idea of literary interpretation in a solidly defensible manner)

That was okay, I only needed slightly more than a 3.0 to keep the scholarship and that would be fairly easy, right? . . . Wrong. I made the mistake of taking Sarah Fairfield’s Sociology class (when I couldn’t get into Dr. Frey’s) Don’t get me wrong, theoretically, I would have loved Sociology, it is just the kind of study that I love to do and I would have loved to learn how societies work, and how all the little things come together to make society. But Fairfield did a really bad job of teaching the class, didn’t do a good job of engaging with the material and didn’t tie anything together (which I thought was pretty much the entire point of Sociology. . . ) and on top of that she graded the papers and journal entries really hard, which made it really hard to actually do well without engaging with anything.

In the end I made it through that class with a C- and happy with a passing grade. . . well the put my career GPA at 2.9. . . just shy of the 3.0 I needed to keep that $3000 a semester. My parents were far from pleased and the pressure was on, I needed to make a lot more money and I was going to be stuck with a lot more debt. My financial aid packet came from Geneva today and instead of the $3000 scholarship for academic excellence, I had a $2700 grant each semester based on financial need, making it only $600 I have to make up rather than $6000. I was much relieved and my parents are no longer quite so livid about how badly I did and how under motivated I was to do well in Sociology.

All in all, I am quite happy.

Now I just need that job so I can have some money. . .

Listless

Here I am. In the evening, after a day that has been both satisfying and dissatisfying at the same time. It started out dull enough, with a little sleeping in (as any good Saturday should). Not that I slept in by most people's standards, I was up and showered by 9:00. I did some laundry (which sorely needed to be done) and did some other work around the house, trying not to think too hard about the job search that hasn't been going terribly well (I don't know if it is because I don't want to work on Sunday's or if the places I'm applying at aren't looking for summer help when they say 'now hiring'). I played some video-games, listened to music and watched an episode of Star Trek Voyager.

Then this evening we went to church and hung out with the other families at our church, had a meal and played some board games. There weren't many people there other than the Pastor and his family and the Panichelle's (of course, that is a good 13 right there) and our family. But it was fun to be around all the little ones again after being at college. After that we (all the families from the church) went to my little sister's softball game and watched her team get soundly beaten, still it was 10-and-under softball, which means it wasn't a big deal. I spent half of the time pushing Clara (who is somewhere around 2 years old, but don't quote me on that one) on the swings and following her around and doing her bidding. Little kids are so much fun. We played some Frisbee behind the field and had a good time.

After that we went to Brusters, where my sister Elsa was working. And proceeded to heckle her and order ice-cream. All and all it was a fun day. But still, hanging over it was a sort of dissatisfaction. Something is out of order, I am home for the summer after my first year of college and everything is different. My twin brother is now also back and he is different. Nothing is the same and I'd almost rather be back at college. To make it worse I don't have a job yet and I have no money. And my girlfriend lives in Maryland, and I've never before had to deal with a long-distance relationship. Everything would be easier to deal with if she were here.